


Ever fallen in love with someone you shouldn’t’ve fallen in love with?

by RedChucks



Category: The Mighty Boosh (TV)
Genre: Bisexuality, Buzzcocks lyrics, M/M, Vince POV, bisexual!Vince, unrequited pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-07
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2020-01-06 05:33:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18381986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedChucks/pseuds/RedChucks
Summary: Set just before ‘Journey to the Centre of Punk’, Vince is in a punk club, listening to a Buzzcocks cover band and indulging in a little self-pity whilst thinking about his unrequited feelings for Howard.How many times can I use the word bisexual in one short fic.





	Ever fallen in love with someone you shouldn’t’ve fallen in love with?

“ _Ever_ _fallen_ _in_ _love_ _with_ _someone_ _you_ _shouldn’t’ve_ _fallen_ _in love_ _with?”_

Vince scoffed in to his drink, downing it in one. There had been so many songs over the years that he’d felt were written with him in mind, (Bryan Ferry had tried to explain that the key to a memorable song was in that connection with the listener and that’s why he so often felt that way but Vince still liked to think he was special and that some songs were just destined to be listened to by him) but the one currently playing had been haunting him for years, the question too personal and sentiment too buying, and the jangly rhythm too upbeat by half for such poignant lyrics. Rolling his eyes at himself Vince raised his finger toward the barman, grabbed his new drink and quickly downed it, wincing at the taste, at the way the barman smirked at his face, and at his brain for throwing the words “poignant lyrics” at him. It was something Howard had said once when talking about some song he thought Vince was too shallow to truly understand and he scowled at the memory, hating how fresh the hurt still was.

Howard liked to think he was the only one who knew anything about music and most of the time Vince found it easier to play along and act like he was only interested in pulling shapes and the aesthetics of being in a band rather than the genre or the music itself, but sometimes he just wanted to shout at Howard, and everyone else who talked down to him, to just shut up and stop telling him what he already knew. You didn’t spend your formative childhood years living with Bryan Ferry without learning a whole lot about music, even if you were the least musical of all his children. What Vince didn’t know about music wouldn’t fill a Charlie Book but Howard never saw that, never saw him.

He turned back to the band performing on stage, hating how effortlessly attractive the frontman was, or possibly frontwoman, it was hard to tell. They weren’t the headline act, just the warm up band, and they were mostly playing covers, but they’d chosen their covers well and Vince was impressed. He was supposed to be there to check out Terminal Margaret, who were on next, to see whether he could picture himself as their new frontman but the band that currently had the crowd jumping were drawing him in more than what he’d heard about TM. They’d played quite a few Buzzcocks covers for a start and Vince had always had a soft spot for any band that boasted a proud and out bisexual like that band had. Bryan had told him once that it was natural to seek out idols of the same orientation as yourself, especially when you were young - as natural as being bisexual in fact - and that talking about those idols with friends and family could make coming out easier for all parties involved. Vince had just nodded at the time, fourteen and blushing all the way to his toes, now he wondered whether he should use music as a way of coming out as bi to Howard. He’d tried several times over the years, using fashion metaphors mostly, which hadn’t worked well, and more recently with a stationary metaphor, because Howard liked stationary, but it hadn’t worked at all. It had in fact gone very badly and Vince had ended up getting his metaphors mixed whilst Howard stared at him like a puppy desperate to understand until Vince had just stormed off in a huff. But maybe music was the way to go, because he really did want to find a way to finally explain to his best friend that he wasn’t only interested in girls, that he might in fact be quite interested in guys as well, or at least, one in particular. Then again maybe not.

Howard only thought of Vince as a friend, he knew that for a fact. When Howard had been going through his poet phase he’d even likened their friendship to that of some war poets Vince had never heard of (he’d tried to remember their names to ask Leroy about later but even Leroy’d had no clue of who Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon were and he’d been to university and all so Vince had been left confused and filled with a feeling of inadequacy. Howard would never thank pf him the way he thought about Howard. Howard had been obsessed with unattainable women for as long as Vince had known him and had never so much as peaked at Vince back at the zoo when he’d been changing in to his panda outfit. Howard didn’t, couldn’t, never would fancy him, so there was probably no point in coming out. The last thing he wanted was to be scoffed at and told that his sexuality didn’t exist _actually_ , and that all supposed bisexuals only identified as such for the attention, which was exactly the sort of thing someone like Vince was bound to do. He didn’t need that argument, no sir.

_“Ever fallen in love with someone you shouldn’t’ve fallen in love with?”_

Vince glared at the band. They were good. He’d quite like to be in that band except that they already had a genius frontperson, looking out lazily across the crowd, somehow managing to make a ragged tie and untucked shirt look unbelievably cool. Vince could never manage to look that cool with so little effort, he had to work at it, and it was a full time job just keeping people interested enough to remember he was there, so he didn’t just fade in to the background. It was why he was looking in to punk. It had been a natural progression from Joan Jett rock toward punk (Vince’s music collection wasn’t organised alphabetically but by genre evolution. It was a complex system but it made sense to Vince, even if Howard called it a kind of musical madness) and Vince had pounced on the punk look because punks didn’t ever fade in to the background, they stood out and were remembered, and Vince wanted that more than just about anything. Well, almost anything.

 _“Ever_ _fallen in love with someone?”_

Vince gestured for a third drink, wishing the band had chosen any other song instead of one that had reminded him so much of his impossible predicament with Howard. Then again, if he was honest he’d admit that just about any song could remind him of his unrequited love for his best mate. He should just tell Howard that he was in to blokes, to at least start the conversation, but that wasn’t the way things worked with Howard, he couldn’t just come out with something like that, he had to work up to it quietly, step up to it sideways. It wasn’t like buying a ladder! And things had been so rotten between them for so long he wasn’t even sure that Howard would want to have that sort of conversation with him any more. There had been too many broken moments between them and he pushed down the guilt that was creeping up his throat with a swig of his newly poured drink. He’d need to do some serious grovelling before he could talk to Howard about anything serious, he thought muzzily, finally enjoying the warmth of the alcohol as it flowed through him. He’d have to do something nice, like show Howard his latest scrap book (because Howard loved a good scrap book) and maybe even let him listen to some jazz in the shop before he could start talking about androgynous frontpersons and bisexual punk bands.

 _“Ever fallen in love with someone you_ _shouldn’t’ve fallen in love with?”_

The final notes jangled out of the cheap guitars and Vince nodded as the crowd all around him roared. Yeah, he’d fallen in love with someone he shouldn’t’ve, he was practically an expert on the subject, but he’d do something about it, he promised himself. He’d find a way to get back in to Howard’s good books and then, bit by bit, he’d find a way to tell him the truth.

Up on the stage the warm up band had sauntered off and been replaced by Terminal Margaret, one of the hottest punk bands in town, or so the rumours went. Now _there_ was a band in need of a good, gender bending, bisexual, frontperson and Vince could see himself fitting that position to a T.


End file.
